DESPITE MUSK'S TRUMP ENDORSEMENT, X REMAINS A GO-TO PLATFORM FOR DEMOCRATS

A week after Elon Musk endorsed Donald Trump for president, President Joe Biden's team used Musk's social media platform X — in addition to more neutral spaces such as Facebook and Instagram― to announce he is ending his reelection campaign.

It's a testament to how ingrained the platform has become among the power players of the political and media world, as well as users looking for news and live updates of major events. While Meta's Facebook and Instagram, along with TikTok, boast far more users, X users say keeping up with the news is not the reason they use those platforms, according to a recent survey by the Pew Research Center. X is the exception: most of the site’s users say following the news is a reason they use it and about half say they regularly get their news from there.

“X is where history happens,” posted X CEO Linda Yaccarino with a screenshot of Biden’s announcement. While a comment pointed out that the same message was posted on other social media platforms as well, the narrative remains an important one for X and its long-touted efforts to become a “digital town square.”

“Other platforms have emerged with the goal of supplanting X, but what events like the Biden post shows is that this is still where people go to make both fast and consequential impact,” said Sarah Kreps, director of Cornell University’s Tech Policy Institute.